Karin McLean could never
pinpoint when she ovulated – until
her software engineer husband, Shane, developed an iPhone application.
Dubbed Lady Biz, the program
tracks her menstrual cycles, and daily basal body temperatures. “It
took me two years to get pregnant,” says McLean, a 36-year-old sales
professional from Lindon, Utah, whose baby is due in May. “Now, I can
look back and see I got pregnant on Cycle Day 16. Next time, I’ll know.”
McLean is not alone. More
than 1,500 copies of Lady Biz have been purchased from
Apple’s App Store in iTunes – a website where third-party software
designers hawk
their programs, a growing number of which are aimed at women.
Sure, some of these apps are
traditional girly stuff – programs that let you try on a new celebrity
hairstyle or preview Ralph Lauren’s 2009 Fall Collection.
But there are other
applications that are eminently useful in the super-busy lives that most
women have to juggle. There’s an application that turns an iPhone into a
travel baby monitor. And a program called Shopper lets you keep track of
grocery lists week by week, store by store.
“There’s an arms race going
on between manufacturers,” says Kevin Restivo, a mobile phone analyst at
IDC Canada, a Toronto-based research firm. He’s referring to Apple’s App
Store and Waterloo-based Research in Motion’s just-launched BlackBerry
App World. “A platform is more valuable if you’ve got applications.”
Roberta Cozza, a
British-based mobile-phone analyst with Gartner Group, says applications
aimed at women are a way to compensate for the fact that the vast
majority of phones are “designed really by men and for men.
“Most of the vendors really
are missing an opportunity,” Cozza says, referring to the fact that
women are major consumers of mobile phones (the accepted industry stat
is that women influence 89 per cent of consumer electronic purchases).
“It is a shame that the
market is so much more oriented in design for a male audience.”
Sometimes a simple aesthetic
change can make all the difference in making a product appeal to women.
Casie Stewart, a 26-year-old
Toronto project co-ordinator, installed Tinker Bell-themed software onto
her silver BlackBerry Curve to better reflect her personality. “I don’t
want a regular BlackBerry like all the guys in my office,” she says. “I
like mine more unique and girly.”
The BlackBerry Pearl proved
popular among women with its smaller, friendlier size. Telus created a
pink version to raise funds for Rethink Breast Cancer that was also a
hot seller. But Cozza says turning a phone pink misses the point in
catering to women.
Ed Boyd, the new lead
industrial designer of Dell’s consumer products, used to design watches
and sunglasses at Nike. The company had a saying: “If you shrink it and
pink it, it’s not enough,” he says.
Cozza says women tend to
prefer protective clamshell designs like flip phones or those with
sliding keyboards because, in a handbag, they’re less likely to get
dirty or accidentally dial. She also says touch-screen keyboards on smartphones such as the BlackBerry Storm have alienated some women
because the keys don’t respond to fingernails.
Natalie Gee agrees. She
traded her iPhone in for a BlackBerry Curve because she was spending too
much time training her fingers to hit the touch-screen keys properly.
Gee, co-owner of
makeup/grooming studio Gee Beauty in Toronto’s upscale Rosedale area,
also didn’t like how dirty the screen got with fingerprints.
She estimates that 70 per
cent of her clientele prefer regular keyboards because they can type
e-mail quicker on raised keys. Women tend to buy phones that will adapt
to them, not the other way around, she says.
Melanie Fine, 39, of
Richmond Hill, Ont., says changing the way her thumbs hit the
touchscreen keyboard on her new iPhone was worth the trouble.
The certified public
accountant, who owns an IT services company with her husband, says she
has become an “iPhone junkie” since switching from her red BlackBerry
Pearl in November, taking full advantage of many apps to enhance her
busy life.
Shopper, a program created
by a company called MidCentury Software and available on Apple’s App
Store, is among her favourite applications. It allows her to keep
running shopping lists on her phone for the grocery store, Costco and
Home Depot. Not only does it help her plan meals, she says she saves
time and money by sticking to her list and avoiding impulse purchases.
“People look at me funny,”
she laughs. “Most women are walking around the grocery store with their
handwritten lists and here I am pegging off stuff on my iPhone. It looks
like I’m playing with my e-mail or something. But I’m getting in and out
of the store faster than they are.”
A demo of the Lady Biz app
can be seen at www.youtube.com/watch?v=EP8l5_UH-6o
Sheryl Steinberg’s
tech-inspired novel Opportunity
Rings is
being published this month by Key
Porter Books.